George Shultz and the establishment Republicans did irreparable harm to the U.S when they handpicked George W. Bush as their candidate. These people are directly responsible for the political gridlock and for the "fiscal cliff" that we are facing--and they have yet to accept responsibility for their disastrous choice. Can someone explain to me why these nitwits did not support John McCain, who would have won by a landslide in 2000--as indicated by the way he drubbed W in the New Hampshire primary?

In April, 1998, George Bush was in California when he was invited to the home of former secretary of state George Shultz. Shultz had wanted the governor of Texas to meet with some policy experts.

GEORGE SHULTZ, Secretary of State, 1982-88: We said; 'Well, why don't you come over to my house, and I'll gather some of the usual suspects around and we'll talk about policy issues." And he accepted. So he sat here in this living room, and I had Mike Boskin, Condoleezza Rice and John Taylor, who is now undersecretary of the treasury.

NARRATOR: They were looking for a candidate for 2000 with good political instincts, someone they could work with.

GEORGE SHULTZ: What impressed me the most was every once in a while, something would come up and he'd say, "I don't know much about that. Why doesn't somebody talk about it a little bit."

MICHAEL BOSKIN, Advisor to Bush Sr., 1988-'92: I think the single most important things that came out of that meeting were a group of people basically saying, "This guy could be really good." You know, "He's straightforward. He asked tough questions. He's a guy we can get behind."

GEORGE SHULTZ: When we got through, I said to him, "You must be considering running for president. And I hope you do because it seems to me you have a good seat-of-the-pants for the job."

NARRATOR: Bush now had one of the party's elder statesmen in his corner. And by late 1998, money was pouring into Bush's campaign coffers.